Is it Good Luck?

On Friday morning I talked to someone at the Dept of Ed about my “in-school deferment”. Apparently, when I took the writing class at the local community college this summer the school informed them and I was automatically enrolled in the deferment program. The representative changed my records and told me that my payments will resume in October. I asked, “does that mean I don’t make a payment for September?” and he replied “yes”.

I was thinking about sending the money in any way or putting it in my Emergency Fund. Then, at lunchtime, disaster struck. I ended up with a $490 plumbing bill. My kitchen pipes were just filled with hard caked on gunk to the point that the water was no longer going down. Probably 60 years of grease and grime, the original cast iron pipes are part of the system with some new PVC.

In addition, the plumbing under the sink was using flexible PVC pipes that trapped everything. I had the clog removed, which was beyond anything liquid plumber can do, unless I trucked in a 50 pound drum of it, and the plumbing replaced under the sink. I always knew I’d have to replace the plumbing under the sink, eventually. Whoever did the plumbing in my house did a poor do-it-yourself or they had a bad plumber. I’ve been slowly fixing things, but its expensive.

While applying that $276 monthly student loan payment to something else would have been nice, I am lucky that I didn’t have to make the payment this month. Now I have it to apply to my plumbing bill.

I could say the whole mess is unlucky, but I’d rather look at it as the universe giving me just a little extra help.